I have a question for you. When you think back about the good times, were they really as good as we remember? I’m satisfied that the bad ones were really that bad, but I’m not sure about the good ones. But if the memories of the good ones got better through the years, who cares?
I have happy memories of our officer’s club in Goeppingen, West Germany in the mid to late 60’s. I was assigned to the 4th Armored Division at Cook Barracks (the Flugplatz). We took over the club after the war. There was a small balcony practically in the rafters and supposedly Herman Goering used to stand on the balcony and make speeches.
Life wasn’t always great, but on Friday night, everyone seemed to mosey over to the O-Club, and a good time was had by all. During this time, all the clubs had slot machines. My wife, Carole, would get a $2.00 roll of nickels and she and her girlfriends could entertain themselves for hours. There were problems when someone else was playing their favorite machine, but they would quickly find another favorite machine. The machines were set to win, but they gave everyone a lot of play for a nickel.
I went up to the bar one night and a bunch of lieutenants were drinking to cowboys. Someone would say, “to Roy Rogers,” and they would all take a drink. I think it was a game, but I don’t remember how it was played. We went through Tom Mix, Gene Autry, Billy the Kid, Butch Cassidy, the Cisco Kid, Wyatt Earp, Matt Dillon and Buffalo Bill. We even drank to Jesse James. We were all about done, when I remembered Lash LaRue! Well, the good news was we all had a good time. The bad news was that one of the lieutenants got in his car and went downtown. He ended up with a DWI. I felt bad, but not responsible. Maybe it would have been better if I hadn’t remembered Lash LaRue.
One night, I saw the provost marshal rolling dice with some of his subordinates for drinks. I kidded him about it. It seems that I struck a nerve and the game was over. Some people have no sense of humor, and I never know when to keep my mouth shut. Oh well. But there was great music for dancing in the 60’s and that lead to some great parties.
I will always remember the New Years Eve party in 1968. New Years Eve on a military post is a big deal, and we were having a bash at the O-Club. All decked out in our dress blues and having a very special dinner and dance. For entertainment, we had a comedian coming. He had been on The Gomer Pyle TV show. I think his name was Roy Stuart and he played Corporal Chuck Boyle. He was going to perform at 10:30. Well, he didn’t show. About 11:00, we received a message that because of the bad snow he was running late, but he was coming.
Well, the New Year came and no comic. Another call came in at 12:15 telling us that he was 15 minutes out. People were milling around. We had a young, energetic Division Chief of Staff. Out of nowhere, he appeared and gathered a bunch of us together. He said, “Watch my lead. If this guy isn’t funny, we are going to throw his rear out in the snow!” Now, I won’t get into what constitutes a legal order, but I knew, for better or worse, we would follow our leader. All I could think of was our picture on the front page of the Overseas Weekly!
The good news was that he showed up and was really funny. I probably laughed harder than was necessary, but I was so happy that there would be no snow-covered career-ending donnybrook.